The Harlem Renaissance: Crash Course Theater #41
Summary
TLDRCrash Course Theater explores the Harlem Renaissance, a 1920s cultural movement in Harlem, New York, that revitalized African-American art, music, and literature. It countered racial stereotypes and celebrated Black identity, with artists like Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. The movement saw the rise of Black theater companies and plays, influencing Broadway and advocating for Black artists' visibility and societal equality.
Takeaways
- 🎭 The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement in the 1920s that revitalized art, music, and literature in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York.
- 🌟 It was a response to decades of racial stereotypes and served as a platform for African-American artists to express their experiences and challenge societal norms.
- 📚 The movement was initially termed the 'New Negro Movement' by Alain Locke and was characterized by a surge in African-American artistic expression.
- 👥 It was particularly significant for those who had migrated from the South during the Great Migration and for those from the Caribbean diaspora.
- 🎵 The artists of the Harlem Renaissance explored themes of alienation, discrimination, and the complexities of Black identity in a predominantly white society.
- 🖌️ The period saw a mix of artistic styles, from traditional African and African-American folk forms to modernist and jazz-influenced works.
- 🏛️ Despite segregation in theaters, the 1920s witnessed the rise of Black theater companies and the first all-Black Broadway productions.
- 🎭 The Krigwa Players, founded by W. E. B. Du Bois, were influential for insisting on works that were written, performed, and directed by Black artists.
- 📜 Du Bois outlined the principles for an African-American theater that should be about, by, for, and near the Black community.
- 🌐 The Harlem Renaissance had a significant impact on Broadway, with shows like 'Shuffle Along' and plays by African-American authors gaining recognition.
- 👩🎨 Key figures of the movement, such as Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, made substantial contributions to literature, theater, and the broader cultural discourse on race and identity.
Q & A
What was the Harlem Renaissance?
-The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural, artistic, and social movement that spanned the 1920s, centered in Harlem, Manhattan. It encouraged a dynamic reawakening and reimagining of art, music, and literature, particularly by African-American artists, as a corrective to decades of stereotypes and discrimination.
How did the Harlem Renaissance challenge stereotypes and increase visibility for Black Americans?
-The Harlem Renaissance invited African-American artists to practice forms of art that would shatter stereotypes, increase visibility, and uplift Black Americans. It allowed for the exploration of difficult themes such as alienation, discrimination, and the discomfort of performing Black identity in a white world.
What is 'double-consciousness' as described by W. E. B. Du Bois?
-Double-consciousness is a term coined by W. E. B. Du Bois to describe the feeling of being Black and American at the same time, seeing oneself as simultaneously part of, and not part of society. It reflects the complex experience of African Americans navigating their identity in a predominantly white society.
What was the significance of the play 'In Dahomey' in the context of the Harlem Renaissance?
-'In Dahomey' was a Broadway musical comedy written by and starring African-Americans in 1903. It was significant as it was one of the early works by Black composers that made it to Broadway, although it relied heavily on stereotypes. It represented a step towards the recognition of Black artists in the mainstream theater.
Who were some of the early Black theater companies during the Harlem Renaissance?
-Early Black theater companies during the Harlem Renaissance included Anita Bush’s Bush Players (later called the Lafayette Players), the Ida Anderson Players, the Acme Players (which later became the National Ethiopian Art Theater), and the Negro Players.
What was the Krigwa Players and what was its significance?
-The Krigwa Players, founded by W. E. B. Du Bois and Regina Anderson in 1925, was an influential African-American theater troupe. It was significant for its insistence that works be performed, written, AND directed by Black artists, which was a key principle of the Harlem Renaissance.
What were the four criteria for an African-American theater as outlined by Du Bois in 'The Crisis'?
-Du Bois outlined four criteria for an African-American theater in 'The Crisis': 1) About us, meaning plots should reveal Negro life as it is; 2) By us, meaning written by Negro authors who understand what it means to be a Negro; 3) For us, meaning the theater should cater primarily to Negro audiences; 4) Near us, meaning the theater should be in a Negro neighborhood.
Why was the play 'Shuffle Along' significant in the history of African-American theater?
-'Shuffle Along' was significant because it was a wildly successful jazz musical that introduced African-American music and dance to a broader audience. It featured notable figures like Josephine Baker and Paul Robeson and sparked a minor craze for African-American shows on Broadway.
Who were Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, and what were their contributions to the Harlem Renaissance?
-Langston Hughes was a poet who had a Broadway hit with 'Mulatto' and established several theater companies. Zora Neale Hurston was a folklorist and novelist who won the 'Opportunity' playwriting contest. Both were key figures in the Harlem Renaissance, contributing significantly to literature, theater, and the celebration of African-American culture.
What is the play 'Don’t You Want to Be Free?' by Langston Hughes about, and how does it reflect the themes of the Harlem Renaissance?
-‘Don’t You Want to Be Free?’ is a play by Langston Hughes that uses theater to make clear political points about the Black experience in America, including slavery, the Great Migration, and the struggle for civil rights. It reflects the themes of the Harlem Renaissance by incorporating poetry, music, and dance, and by advocating for unity and collective action for greater equality.
Outlines
🎭 Introduction to the Harlem Renaissance
The video script introduces the Harlem Renaissance, a vibrant cultural movement of the 1920s centered in Harlem, Manhattan. It highlights the movement's significance as a corrective to previous negative portrayals of African Americans in art and entertainment. The script discusses the movement's origins with the 'New Negro Movement' and its focus on art that would challenge stereotypes and uplift Black Americans. It also touches on the exploration of themes like alienation and discrimination, as well as the influence of African and African-American folk forms on the art of the period. The Harlem Renaissance marked a time when Black artists began to gain recognition both within and outside their communities, despite the continued presence of segregation and blackface in American theaters.
🎩 The Rise of Black Theater and Playwrights
This section delves into the emergence of Black theater companies and the evolution of African-American theater during the Harlem Renaissance. It discusses the early African-American theater companies such as Anita Bush's Bush Players, later known as the Lafayette Players, and the impact of Ridgely Torrence's 'Three Plays for a Negro Theatre'. The script also covers the founding of Krigwa by W. E. B. Du Bois, which sponsored a playwriting contest and encouraged realistic portrayals of Black life. The influence of the Krigwa Players, who insisted on works being performed, written, and directed by Black artists, is emphasized. The section also highlights the success of 'Shuffle Along' and the Broadway debuts of plays by African-American authors like Willis Richardson and Garland Anderson. Key figures of the Harlem Renaissance, Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, are introduced, along with their contributions to theater and literature.
📜 The Impact and Legacy of the Harlem Renaissance
The final paragraph discusses the broader impact of the Harlem Renaissance on theater and society. It focuses on Langston Hughes's play 'Don't You Want to Be Free?' as an example of how theater was used to convey political messages and celebrate African-American history and culture. The play's narrative, which includes the history of slavery, the Great Migration, and the Civil Rights movement, is summarized. The script also touches on the collaborative efforts of Hughes and Hurston on 'Mule Bone' and the eventual souring of their relationship. The paragraph concludes with a look forward to the Federal Theater Project and the influence of Stanislavski's realistic acting on American theater, setting the stage for the next episode in the series.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Harlem Renaissance
💡Great Migration
💡Double-consciousness
💡African-American theater
💡Segregation
💡Blackface
💡Krigwa
💡Zora Neale Hurston
💡Langston Hughes
💡Mule Bone
💡Don’t You Want to Be Free?
Highlights
The Harlem Renaissance was a 1920s cultural movement centered in Harlem, Manhattan, that encouraged a reawakening and reimagining of art, music, and literature.
The movement was a corrective to decades of melodramas, minstrelsy, and blackface, and unlike the other Renaissance, it was free from plague.
Harlem was described as a 'Black city' in the heart of white Manhattan, with a high concentration of African-Americans.
The Harlem Renaissance was characterized as the 'New Negro Movement' by Alain Locke, inviting artists to shatter stereotypes and uplift Black Americans.
Artists explored themes of alienation, discrimination, and the discomfort of performing Black identity in a white world.
W. E. B. Du Bois described the phenomenon of 'double-consciousness', feeling both part of and apart from society as a Black American.
Artists looked to both African and African-American folk forms and newer forms like modernism and jazz-echoing rhythms.
The 1920s saw the white world and much of the Black world begin to celebrate Black artists, who had previously been unrecognized outside their communities.
In 1903, 'In Dahomey' was a Broadway musical comedy written by and starring African-Americans, relying on stereotypes.
Ridgely Torrence's 'Three Plays for a Negro Theatre' created a sensation with realistic portrayals of Black life, initially performed by white actors.
The Neighborhood Playhouse hosted 'Rachel', a play by Black playwright Angelina Grimke, with an all-Black cast, exploring the impact of racism.
The early 20th century saw a rise in Black theater companies, such as Anita Bush’s Bush Players, later called the Lafayette Players.
Du Bois founded Krigwa, which sponsored a playwriting contest and encouraged truthful and sincere portrayals of Black life.
The Krigwa Players, founded by Du Bois and Regina Anderson, insisted on works performed, written, and directed by Black artists.
Du Bois outlined the principles of African-American theater in 'The Crisis', emphasizing works about, by, for, and near Black people.
African-American works like 'Shuffle Along' made it to Broadway, setting off a craze for Black shows.
Willis Richardson's 'The Chip Woman’s Fortune' was produced on Broadway, earning good reviews.
Garland Anderson’s 'Appearances' was the first full-length straight play by an African-American author to open on Broadway.
Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston were key figures of the Harlem Renaissance, contributing significantly to theater and literature.
Hughes and Hurston collaborated on the play 'Mule Bone', which was never finished due to a soured working relationship.
Langston Hughes' play 'Don’t You Want to Be Free?' used theater to make political points and celebrate African-American performance.
Transcripts
Hey there, I’m Mike Rugnetta, this is Crash Course Theater,
and today we’re exploring the Harlem Renaissance!
This 1920s movement, centered in an uptown Manhattan neighborhood,
encouraged a dynamic reawakening and reimagining of art, music and literature.
It was a very necessary corrective to all of those decades
of melodramas, minstrelsy, and blackface.
And, unlike the other Renaissance, there was no bubonic plague!
We’ll take a look at the Harlem Renaissance more broadly and then
explore the playwrights and theater companies it birthed.
Lights up!
[INTRO MUSIC]
The Harlem Renaissance roughly spanned the 1920s,
spreading out from Harlem and across America’s Northeast.
Writer James Weldon Johnson wrote about the Harlem of that era:
“Not merely a colony or a community or a settlement…
but a Black city, located in the heart of white Manhattan,
and containing more Negroes to the square mile than any other spot on Earth.
It strikes the uninformed observer as a phenomenon, a miracle.”
First characterized by the writer Alain Locke as the “New Negro Movement,”
the Harlem Renaissance was by and for people who
had arrived from the South during the Great Migration
and others who had arrived in The United States via the Caribbean diaspora.
This movement invited African-American artists to practice forms of art
that would shatter stereotypes, increase visibility, and uplift Black Americans.
Much of the work was celebratory, but artists didn’t shy away from difficult themes.
Alienation, discrimination, and the discomfort of performing
Black identity in a white world were all explored.
This is an example of the phenomenon that theorist and activist W. E. B.
Du Bois described as “double-consciousness”
—the feeling of being Black, and American, at the same time;
of seeing yourself as simultaneously part of, and not part of society.
In terms of form and genre, some artists of the period
looked back to distinctly African and African-American folk forms,
like fables and spirituals, while others looked to newer forms,
like the fractured modernism of Jean Toomer’s “Cane”
or the jazz-echoing rhythms of poems by Langston Hughes and Geraldine Brooks.
The Harlem Renaissance was pretty much the moment when the white world
(and also a lot of the Black world) began to celebrate Black artists.
This doesn’t mean that Black artists were new to America
—far from it—
but many of them hadn’t been known or honored outside of their communities.
In the 1920s, theaters in New York were still largely segregated.
Blacks and whites typically sat in different sections,
and I’m sad to report that blackface was still a thing.
In 1903, there had been a Broadway musical comedy, “In Dahomey,”
written by and starring African-Americans,
as well as several other Broadway-adjacent musicals by Black composers—
though like “In Dahomey,” these relied pretty heavily on stereotype.
In terms of serious, non-musical plays,
the white playwright Ridgely Torrence created a sensation with “Three Plays for a Negro Theatre,”
crafting realistic portrayals of Black life.
These plays were originally performed by white actors,
but in 1917, an all-Black cast,
directed by Robert Edmond Jones, led the Broadway production.
This was a Broadway first.
“Three Negro Plays Played by Negros,” was the headline in the New York Times.
The critic said that the “interesting and sympathetic plays” were “inadequately acted.”
In that same year, one of Manhattan’s little theaters,
the Neighborhood Playhouse,
hosted “Rachel,” a play written by a Black playwright,
Angelina Grimke, and staged with an all-Black cast.
“Rachel” is the story of a young African-American
woman so shaken by the racism she discovers all around her
that she vows never to have children.
The early 20th century saw an enormous upsurge in Black theater companies.
The first important African-American theater company of this era was Anita Bush’s Bush Players,
later called the Lafayette Players, founded in 1916.
Most of the Bush Players’ plays were written by white playwrights,
but they were performed for mostly Black audiences.
Other early companies included the Ida Anderson Players,
the Acme Players, which later became the National Ethiopian Art Theater,
and the Negro Players, the company that had first performed “Three Plays for a Negro Theater.”
In the midst of the Harlem Renaissance, Du Bois,
then-editor of the NAACP’s monthly magazine “The Crisis,”
founded Krigwa, which is almost an acronym for the Crisis Guild of Writers and Artists.
Krigwa sponsored a playwriting contest and encouraged entrants to
“Write about things as you know them…
You do not have to confine your writings to the portrayal of beggars, scoundrels, and prostitutes;
you can write about ordinary decent colored people if you want.
On the other hand, do not fear the Truth. Plumb the depths.
If you want to paint Crime and Destitution and Evil paint it…
But be true, be sincere, be thorough, and do a beautiful job.”
“Opportunity,” an African-American literary journal,
also sponsored a playwriting contest,
awarding prizes to Zora Neale Hurston and Eulalie Spence.
In 1925 Du Bois and Regina Anderson founded the Krigwa Players,
based out of the basement of a public library on 135th Street.
While it only lasted for three seasons before splitting into a number of offshoots,
it was probably the most influential African-American theater troupe,
owing to its insistence that works be performed, written, AND directed by Black artists.
In 1926, Du Bois published an influential manifesto in “The Crisis”
establishing what an African-American theater should be:
“1. About us. That is, they must have plots which reveal Negro life as it is.
2. By us. That is, they must be written by Negro authors
who understand from birth and continued association
just what it means to be a Negro today.
3. For us. That is, the theatre must cater primarily to Negro audiences
and be supported and sustained by their entertainment and approval.
4. Near us. The theatre must be in a Negro
neighborhood near the mass of ordinary Negro people.”
While a lot of the innovation was happening in the little theaters,
African-American works were making it to Broadway, too.
In 1921, the team of Noble Sissle and Eubie
Blake introduced “Shuffle Along,”
a wildly successful jazz musical that featured Josephine Baker and Paul Robeson in small roles.
Langston Hughes called it “a honey of a show…
swift, bright, funny, rollicking, and gay, with a dozen danceable, singable tunes…
Everybody was in the audience— including me.”
“Shuffle Along” set off a minor craze for African-American shows,
and nine more made it to Broadway in the next three years.
In 1923, Willis Richardson, who had won the Krigwa playwriting contest several times,
had a one-act slice-of-life play, “The Chip Woman’s Fortune,”
which was produced on Broadway and earned pretty good reviews.
In 1925, Garland Anderson’s “Appearances,”
a melodrama about a black bellhop falsely accused of rape,
became the first full-length straight play by an African-American author to open on Broadway.
But MOST Broadway plays about Black life were still the work of white playwrights—
who sometimes even won Pulitzer Prizes for them.
Let’s look at two key figures of the Harlem Renaissance:
Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston.
Hurston, a folklorist and a novelist,
was an early winner of the “Opportunity” playwriting contest.
“Color Struck,” an “Opportunity” winner,
is about colorism among a group of Black Floridians.
The play makes use of Southern Black speech,
which Hurston, a trained anthropologist, carefully studied.
Hurston later channeled an interest in African and African-American folktales into several revues:
“The Great Day,” “From Sun to Sun,” and “Singing Steel.”
Better known as a poet, Hughes had a Broadway hit in 1935 with “Mulatto,”
a poetic play about a mixed-race child and his desire to
be acknowledged as his father’s heir.
Hughes subtitled the play a tragedy,
but when it was produced on Broadway,
changes were made that brought it closer to melodrama,
making it more palatable to a white audience.
Hughes was not thrilled.
He once told James Baldwin,
“If you want to die, be maladjusted,
neurotic and psychotic, disappointed and disjointed…just write plays, Go ahead.”
Still, he established three theater companies: the Suitcase Theater in Harlem,
the Negro Art Theater in Los Angeles, and the Skyloft Players in Chicago
—and continued to write plays and lyrics throughout his life,
including “Little Ham,” a folk comedy celebrating Harlem in the ‘20s.
Together, Hurston and Hughes collaborated on the 1930 play “Mule Bone.”
Based on a Florida folktale,
it’s a comedy about two men who come to blows over a woman.
But Hurston and Hughes’s working relationship soured,
and the play was never finished.
For a closer look at the theater of the Harlem Renaissance,
let’s explore “Don’t You Want to Be Free?,”
a play Hughes wrote in 1937 for the Suitcase Theater.
When the play begins, the stage is bare except for a lynching rope and an auction block.
A young man steps out and explains the set:
“We haven’t got any scenery, or painted curtains, because we haven’t got any money to buy them.
But we’ve got something you can’t buy with money, anyway.
We’ve got faith in ourselves. And in you.
So we’re going to put on a show.”
The show, he says, is about what it means to be Black in America.
Help us out, Thought Bubble:
Cymbals crash and tom-toms thump as a young woman begins to dance an African
dance while reciting some of Hughes’s poetry.
She is joined by a young man who describes the capture of
slaves and their arrival at Jamestown in 1619.
Several characters are sold as slaves, but one young man resists.
While he’s being whipped, other characters begin to sing his protest song,
“Go Down, Moses.” The Civil War arrives.
Then sharecropping and Jim Crow. Then the Great Migration.
The Harlem Renaissance. The Great Depression.
The first stirrings of the Civil Rights movement.
In every scene, characters chant poems and the chorus sings hymns and spirituals.
Toward the end of the pageant, the residents of Harlem begin to
resist the landlords and small business owners who discriminate against them.
This move culminates in the 1935 Harlem Riots.
The play then directly asks the audience to organize,
join unions and tenants leagues,
and get together with members of the white working class.
As one character says, “When…Black and white really get together,
what power in the world can stop us from getting what we want?”
The show ends with the entire cast linking hands with the audience and singing:
“Oh, who wants to come and join hands with me? Who wants to make one great unity?
Who wants to say, no more black or white? Then let’s get together, folks,
And fight, fight, fight!”
Fight, fight, fight! Wow.
Thanks, Thought Bubble.
This pageant is modern, fragmentary,
almost Brechtian—we’re gonna get to that adjective soon.
It uses theater to make some clear political points.
But in its reliance on poetry, music, and dance,
“Don’t You Want to Be Free?” also argues that African-American performance
is inextricable from African-American history,
and that it will accompany people of color as they push for greater equality.
Thanks for watching.
We’ll see you next time, when we move from little theaters to a really, really, really big one:
the WPA’s Federal Theater Project.
And hang onto your seagulls, everybody,
because Stanislavski and realistic acting are coming to America,
courtesy of the Group Theater.
Group hug, Yorick? No?
Well Group Curtain, then.
Crash Course Theater is produced in association with PBS Digital Studios.
Crash Course Theater is filmed in Indianapolis, Indiana,
and is produced with the help of all of these very nice people.
Our animation team is Thought Cafe.
Crash Course exists thanks to the generous support of our patrons on Patreon.
Patreon is a voluntary subscription service where
you can support the content you love through a monthly donation
and help keep Crash Course free, for everyone, forever.
Thanks for watching.
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